Elevated blood glucose and blood lipids are a relatively common underlying condition in numerous diseases and may be acquired in various ways. Among other causes, elevated blood glucose levels are frequently precipitated by an altered metabolism associated with a diabetic condition, and treatment of diabetic conditions often includes insulin therapy along with synthetic oral anti-diabetic agents, such as metformin, sulfonylurea, etc. Despite an improvement of some clinical parameters (i.e. reduction of blood glucose to at least some extent) in people with elevated blood lipid and blood glucose, various side effects, including insulin resistance, allergic reactions, etc. may arise from long-term treatment using insulin.
Alternative treatments of diabetes, and especially non-insulin dependent diabetes mellitus (NIDDM), are frequently based on yeast, or derivatives of yeast. Yeast can be grown in the presence of chromium salts, and yeast cells or extracts of cells grown in that manner are particularly rich in “glucose tolerance factor” (GTF), a compound known to enhance the biological effect of insulin. Although some yeast preparations help reduce elevated blood glucose concentrations, in many cases, considerable amounts of yeast preparations must be ingested for a substantial period in order to improve a hyperglycemic condition. Moreover, long-term use of yeast preparations over extended periods tends to become problematic for some patients, especially in patients who have a history of yeast infections. Still further, many crude yeast preparations have a bitter taste that some patients may find objectionable.
To alleviate at least some of the problems associated with yeast preparations, concentrated, de-bittered and freeze dried yeast preparations have been developed. Such preparations are typically in tablet form, and may conveniently be ingested during a meal. However, the relatively high degree of processing of such cells/extracts may reduce the biological potency of the yeast preparation. Moreover, preservatives and additives (e.g., for pressing or otherwise forming of tablets) are typically needed to maintain at least some anti-hyperglycemic activity.
In still other methods of reducing blood glucose on a non-insulin basis, chromium picolinate may be administered. Chromium picolinate is reported to be moderately effective in reducing an elevated blood glucose level in human. However, chromium picolinate exhibits considerable toxicity and may therefore not be generally regarded as safe.
It has recently been reported that methods to increase intracellular levels of activated AMPK result in one of a number of beneficial effects, including reducing insulin resistance and glucose concentrations in an organism. However, although various methods to increase intracellular levels of activated AMPK are known in the art, all or almost all of them suffer from one or more disadvantages. Therefore, there is still a need to provide improved compositions and methods to increase intracellular levels of activated AMPK.